Tower of Memories

It was snowing. Little soft bits of white drifting down with the weight of feathers. It must have just started, for the ground was still covered in healthy plants. Vibrant greens with small interruptions of little red flowers. I was surrounded by trees, but the trunks were completely covered by the foliage.

I walked forward, somehow not tripping on any of the thick flora. No crunch from beneath my feet either. Not from dead leaves or the snow.

The density of red flowers increased as I continued forward. Sizes varied from between the length of my pinkie finger to the size of a dinner plate. They all had the same triangle shaped petals. Small things, layered on top of each other like pages of a book. They had a rough texture, reminding me of coarse sandpaper.

Eventually they stopped at a massive cluster of red in front of a tree as thick as a car. I couldn't even see the green beneath that many flowers.

I knelt on the ground, settling into a position with my legs partially tucked underneath me. I reached out for the petals. The flowers fell apart as soon as I touched them. Pieces of red scattering and mixing with the still falling snow.

It was coming down heavier now. Covering the floor of the forest and sticking to me and the tree.

There was something under the massive bundle of red.

I wiped the rest of the flowers away, watching the petals flood the air and my vison for a moment before they settled in a pool around me.

It was a grave. A thick slab of grey stone speckled with black and white. Carved into it, with clear print lettering, was a name.

Serafina Holly Stewart.

I woke with a gasp.

It was morning. Sunlight slipped through the curtains and I had to go to classes.

It was fine. The routine might do me some good. As I started to fully wake up the curse did too. Sharp and cold as ever, but condensed to the area where the mark was. It was the same thing as every other morning. I could deal with it.

(*********)

I was fully dressed for the day and leaving the bathroom where Celica and her copy were still braiding her hair.

Jarec and Fethris were standing together next to the stairs. They looked proud. And Jarec was absolutely hiding something behind his back. I was confused for a moment but then I grinned.

They had to be done. That was the only explanation for the look on their faces.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

"Well?" I prompted.

"It's done," Fethris said.

Jarec was shifting and fidgeting in place. "Are you ready for this?"

"Literally anything you've done will be an improvement over our current situation," I told them. It was true. Right now if I needed to tell them something there was a delay of up to hours. Which we might not always have.

"I think this will be a bit more than a simple improvement," Jarec said as he smirked wider.

Then he showed me what he was hiding.

The shape they had chosen wasn't one I had expected. Jarec had made animals almost every time, and this was far from all of them. It wasn't even a plant. It was crystals. There was a five-sided base in all black. The first gem was the smallest, it was a soft poppy red. The middle-sized gem was the darkest color, a deep cherry. The largest was the color of fresh strawberries. The whole thing was about three inches tall. And entirely made of paper.

"Guys! It's beautiful!" There was a swell of emotion in my chest. An overflow of lava-hot something. Probably tears. I threw my arms around both of them. Maybe I was over-reacting, but it had been a messy few days.

They both had to step back, I must have shocked them. Then again, I was surprised too.

This wasn't something I typically did, I knew that. But I think I could be forgiven for being emotional. Especially given the past two days.

"We've got your back," Fethris said. He returned the hug after a moment.

"I know," I said. My voice was shaking. This was ridiculous. I was the calm, collected, stoic one. Now I was about to start crying over my friends.

Get it together Serafina.

"Dragon Tower needs all of us," Jarec said as he returned the hug too.

I let go and stepped back. Letting myself breathe and taking a moment to gather my thoughts. I counted to five before trying to speak again. "You guys are the best."

"We try," Fethris said.

"The large one is for speaking into, responses will come from the small one," Jarec explained as he handed it to me.

I nodded, "Got it."

"If you need help but can't talk, the middle one will alert me if it's damaged. It will tell us where you are."

Were they working on that before we found out about Red? They had to have been. These things took too much time. What kind of trouble were they expecting? It was worse that they were right about it.

"We can only hope you won't need it," Fethris commented.

At this point, that seemed unlikely. I appreciated the sentiment however.

"Thank you both again. This is awesome. And keeping you all updated will be easier."

Perfect for emergencies and day-to-day needs. All we could really do was hope I would primarily use it for the latter. I don't think any of us wanted to think of me bleeding behind a hidden door struggling to reach for something.

(**********)

I pondered the paper creation while looking down at my piece of real quartz. Neither Jarec nor Fethris gave it a name. Names were important. Mom hadn't talked about it, but I'd been here long enough to pick up that there was significance to it.

Part of the spell to bring objects to life was giving it a name.

Joining a coven meant leaving behind your old name.

Mom was using the Stewart name as camouflage for me.

The piece of origami art changed to be functional by magic wasn't exactly Excalibur. But part of me felt that maybe it was wrong for it to not have one. Especially if it was going to maybe save my life someday.

The red crystals made me think of rubies.

There were many famous rubies. I remembered one named after a poem. The Sunrise Ruby.

Sunrise. The ultimate promise of tomorrow, that the sun would come back and everything would be okay. That's what I'd been telling the others. That I would have another tomorrow, another sunrise.

But what if that tomorrow also brought something terrible? What if that sunrise meant the guillotine blade was going to fall? Hard to find hope if an execution is coming.

I wanted a future. A different future. But to do that we would need to break the one we were currently heading for. Tear it down to make room for the new one of our choosing.

Shattering Sunrise, my only real hope for a better tomorrow.